French science historian and writer who wrote a biography on Galileo (1869), in which he ardently defends the scientist whom he presents as the founder of modern science. Among other publications, he wrote a two-volume spiritualist philosophy of nature introducing the history of the physical sciences in antiquity (1849).

Science Quotes by Thomas-Henri Martin (1 quote)

Galileo … asserts that in all these phenomena we must measure all that is measurable, and try to make measurable all that is not directly measurable.

— Thomas-Henri Martin

From the original French, “Galilée … déclare que dans tous ces phénomènes il faut mesurer tout ce qui est mesurable, et tâcher de rendre mesurable tout ce qui ne l’est pas directement,” in Galilée: Les Droits de la Science et la Méthode des Sciences Physiques (1868), 289. Notice the statement is not enclosed in quotation marks; they are the author’s words, not Galileo’s. Translation by Webmaster using Internet resources. Martin’s words are often repeated as an assumed quote by Galileo: Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so. These words do not come verbatim from any known work by Galileo, and should only be used without quotation marks as Martin’s description of Galileo’s method. Nevertheless, quotation marks have been - erroneously - added in many books, for example, in the transcript of a radio talk by Hermann Weyl, 'Mathematics and the Laws of Nature', collected in Warren Weaver (ed.), The Scientists Speak (1947). Reprinted in Isabel S. Gordon and Sophie Sorkin (eds.), The Armchair Science Reader (1959), 301.

In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
(1987) -- Carl Sagan